2 hours ago
5
Three middle-aged women may be all you need for anything. To run a business, raise a village, end a war, retool a civilisation, empty the loft. Even more usefully, you can make a great murder-mystery caper with them, as Lisa McGee (a fourth woman! If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it) has done with her new series How to Get to Heaven from Belfast.
McGee made her name, of course, with Derry Girls – a nigh-on perfect sitcom that followed the trials and tribulations of a group of Northern Irish Catholic schoolgirls (and a beleaguered English cousin) as they went about the chaotic business of growing up in the mid-90s at the tail end of the Troubles. The main characters of the new offering don’t map precisely on to the previous one but the DNA of Derry Girls as an entity remains gloriously alive (is DNA alive? I feel a curious urge to consult Sister Michael). How to Get to Heaven has all of the verve, acuity and havoc dancing on top of the immaculate plotting that you find in McGee’s masterwork. The only difference is that one of the schoolgirls is dead. Probably. Maybe. Perhaps not.
To explain: Dara (Caoilfhionn Dunne), Saoirse (Roisin Gallagher) and Robyn (Sinéad Keenan) are old schoolfriends who reunite to attend the funeral of Greta (Natasha O’Keeffe) – “We’re dying now, is it?” says Robyn, rightly enraged by the relentless march of time – who completed their teenage gang of four. That was, until something went wrong for Greta one night 20 years ago and the three others came to her aid. We get a flashback to a forest shack on fire, a menacing-looking man and satanic-looking symbols on the wall …. The three stayed in touch, bound by friendship and a secret, but lost touch with Greta.
According to the local grapevine, Greta was killed by a fall down the stairs. Saoirse, a TV crime writer by trade (she wanted to write plays but her ambition was stymied by the need to buy stuff), immediately suspects foul play and then foul play of a different order when she notices at the wake that the body in the coffin lacks the occult tattoo (yes, matching the one on the flashback wall) that the four friends have. We all suspect the foulest play when we see that Greta’s husband, Owen, the local police chief, is played by Emmett J Scanlan, the most actually frightening actor in history, who makes me wish to hide behind the sofa as if I were again a child convulsing in terror at Doctor Who. Her mother, Margo (Michelle Fairley), is an almost equally unholy presence.
Something is up all right. Robyn, a deeply stressed wife and mother of four, thinks she might have an insight because things have recently taken a turn for the worse with her Patrick, who has become “very controlling … gaslighting, all that kind of thing”. “He’s only one,” says Dara, sceptically. “He’s one and a half,” says Robyn through gritted teeth, of her toddler. “And he knows what he’s doing.”
She and Dara are reluctant to get involved, but teenage loyalty – and the fear that Greta’s death/disappearance might be connected to the secret in the woods – runs deep. Soon Saoirse has them on side and investigating, and the caper proper begins. It takes in much, at a frenetic pace, and the energy never flags. So much so that you might just occasionally wish it would pause for a moment to allow everyone to catch their breath and give moments time to land. But overall the experience is a switchbacking rush of joy and you would have to be a very cankered soul and/or professional critic to even mention it as a flaw in the midst of so much fun.
There is ill-advised drinking, enigmatic hand-delivered letters, and a young attractive guard called Liam (Darragh Hand) who is willing to brave investigating his boss. There is a car crash, clues gleaned from teenage diaries and buried memories, a trip to Portugal, a possible assassin (Bronagh Gallagher), twist, turns, complications, revelations and much else – including Ardal O’Hanlon as an eccentric hotel owner and Saoirse-Monica Jackson in an absolutely wild, perfect performance a few episodes in. The latter of which is both impossible to describe and would give too much away if I did, but you must see it if you see nothing else this year.
And it’s all written with McGee’s customary wit, brutality and sensitivity. The actors (including the young ones who portray the teenage versions of the adult protagonists) keep the whole thing together and emotionally credible, though the preposterousness of the plot increases at a roughly geometric rate – as questions of conscience (“She’s having an attack of the Catholics”), loyalty and what is owed to whom begin to show through the chaos and the laughs. Buckle up, and enjoy.
